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T O P I C R E V I E W

NAAmodel#240

A story in Air Force Magazine ("Weather or Not") this month says the crew of Apollo 11 were scheduled to splash down right in the midst of violent thunderstorms with powerful high-altitude winds that "would have ripped their parachutes to shreds and that without parachutes, they'd have crashed into the ocean with a force that would have killed them instantly."

The article suggests that it was the insistence of Hickam Air Force Base personnel using classified Corona reconnaissance imagery that finally convinced NASA and the Navy to move the carrier task force.

Sounds rather dramatic to me. Did the Air Force really avert disaster and save the day?

Headshot

I am curious about this also. I recall reading something similar, several years back.

An article, describing the Navy's role in Mercury-Gemini-Apollo spacecraft recovery, in the January 1989 issue of the U.S. Naval Institute's journal Proceedings does not mention any unusual circumstances, from the Navy's point of view, for Apollo 11's recovery. One would believe that moving the landing area at the last minute for Earth's first lunar explorers would be noteworthy.

Jim Behling

Article doesn't say CORONA but Program 417 which was DMSP precursor. That makes it very plausible and in addition, the author has very good credentials.

NAAmodel#240

Part of my confusion stems from the author's comment,"employing data from Program 417 satellites to support the Corona reconnaissance satellite program". If this wasn't CORONA then why mention it?

Jim Behling

Program 417 satellite and the Corona satellite are two different spacecraft

Program 417 spacecraft were created to image cloud cover over targets so as not to waste CORONA spacecraft film. The DOD started using the P-417 satellites to look at weather in other places.

The sentence in question just describes Capt. Hank Brandli's basic job. It looks like he was doing more with the data at hand than just supporting CORONA.

moorouge

You might try locating the web page of Hank Brandli. He claimed to be the person that alerted Mission Control to the dangers of the storm.

As it was, flight controllers could actually do very little to change the re-entry parameters except to lengthen the overshoot downrange to avoid the worst of the weather.

One Big Monkey

I've looked at this in some detail as part of my examination of Apollo images of Earth and satellite weather photographs, and it's quite a confusing story with a lot of players.

The person Brandli contacted was Willard (sometimes referred to as William) Houston, who was involved with the Spacecraft Meteorology Group working with the Apollo program. The SMG already had access to ESSA satellite data and produced their own detailed forecasts. A pre-launch image from Apollo 11 shows Deke Slayton holding a printout from an ESSA satellite while the crew have breakfast.

Taskforce 130, the recovery group, also refer to their own forecasts as being responsible for the change (though it's possible that they originated from elsewhere in the military ie Brandli). There are records in the Taskforce logs of course changes and the reasons for it.

While Brandli claims his data were top secret, ESSA were happily publishing their own role in the change in their in house magazine 'ESSA World'.

My gut feeling is that Brandli did indeed see something but that it would have been spotted anyway, and that a fair amount of his story has a bit of dramatic licence employed for effect. A slightly different slant is that the SMG and other 'official' channels could freely discuss their role (and take the credit for the change) without mentioning the involvement of secret satellite work.

quote:Originally posted by One Big Monkey:Taskforce 130, the recovery group, also refer to their own forecasts as being responsible for the change (though it's possible that they originated from elsewhere in the military ie Brandli). There are records in the Taskforce logs of course changes and the reasons for it.

I'm a bit confused by reference to 'Taskforce 130'. All Apollo recoveries were handled by one of two recovery groups. The Atlantic group was CTF-140 and the Pacific group was CTF-141. So where does your '130' originate from?

One Big Monkey

I got the '130' from the Mission Recovery log (available from the Kennedy Space Centre website if you register) where a weather forecast is referred to as "130's", and also form other sites such as this, where it is referred to as such - there are quite a few others using that reference for other Apollo recovery missions.

If it's incorrect I'll gladly change it

Ross

quote:Originally posted by moorouge:The Atlantic group was CTF-140 and the Pacific group was CTF-141.

I disagree. The Atlantic Taskforce was TF-140 while the Pacific Taskforce was TF-130. The CTF I believe is Commander Task Force. If TF-141 existed it had nothing to do with the US Manned Space Program.

One Big Monkey

This document summarises the task force's involvement and it's clearly identified as 130.

There is a specific reference to deteriorating weather conditions in it.

One Big Monkey

I've been doing some internet trawling thanks to the response querying CTF-130, and I've found an interesting resource.

Patrick Air Force base had its own magazine, "The Missileer", and thanks to their involvement with it there are regular mentions of Apollo. I've come across this one showing the recovery room and describing operations during recovery for Apollo 9.

A previous edition also has a photograph of Apollo 8 during re-entry.

Apart form anything else they are entertaining reads and a window on the US at the time. Well worth a browse through!

moorouge

Glad to see we're all alert and read everything carefully. Yep - you spotted my deliberate mistake. It is CTF-130 for Pacific recovery operations.